After '18-hour work day' fiasco, Pristyn Care co-founder's 'interview hacks' come under fire from netizens

Tribune Web Desk

Chandigarh, September 4

While the controversy over ‘18-hour work day’ by Bombay Shaving Company CEO refuses to die down, another controversy about toxic work culture has surfaced. This one centres around a now-deleted LinkedIn post from Pristyn Care co-founder Harsimarbir Singh, who elucidated at length about the “interview hacks” used at the health-tech company to filter out candidates.

Despite the fact that Harsimarbir Singh appears to have deleted his offending LinkedIn post, screenshots of it have been widely circulated and harshly criticised on Twitter and other social media platforms.

"Interesting interview hacks we used early on to filter for Special Driven people (right attitude)," Singh wrote in his post.

He went on to describe the hacks, the first of which was summoning the candidate at 8 am

Hack number two is to schedule a phone interview at 11 p.m. to find “late workers.”

The next two points were “got the candidate to do a detailed business case - Real world thinking,” and “got the candidate to spend 6-8 hours in office - culture and patience.”

The company also conducted “in person interviews at 9 pm” and scheduled interviews for Sunday, in addition to asking candidates who were not local to show up for job interviews the following day to test their “hustle”.

All of this, predictably, sparked outrage on social media, especially since it came just days after Bombay Shaving Company CEO Shantanu Deshpande's widely panned post in which he advised freshers to work 18 hours a day.

Don't apply to work in such companies if you have even an iota of self-respect. pic.twitter.com/l9AoBZkVGq

— The Educated Moron (@EducatedMoron) September 1, 2022

If you work in Pristyn, get in touch with me and I'll happily help you get jobs at companies with better culture, said another Twitter user. 

If you work in Pristyn, get in touch with me and I'll happily help you get jobs at companies with better culture. https://t.co/rZablX8Rq6

— Narayanan Hariharan (NithyaKarma.com) (@narayananh) September 2, 2022

Avoid working under Harsimarbir Singh at all costs. He is no less than a plague who will ruin your life in a matter of days, said another.

Avoid working under Harsimarbir Singh at all costs. He is no less than a plague who will ruin your life in a matter of days.

Pro tip - Stop using LinkedIn as your daily career logbook. pic.twitter.com/7arlI0ulpe

— Sarsij Nayanam (@sarsij) September 2, 2022

List of organisations I shall never apply to unless my loved ones or I are starving:

1. Pristyn Care
2. pic.twitter.com/HZIhLr7uPY

— Abhishek Mukherjee (@ovshake42) September 2, 2022

A significant portion of the professional workforce has criticised these practises as outdated and toxic, particularly in the era of the ‘Quiet Quitting’ movement, in which workers refuse to work unpaid overtime or take calls after work hours - in other words, doing the bare minimum required of them at their jobs.

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